So Says the Seminarian

A Labor of Love

2012-02-27T14:54:00.000-06:00

I was recently a part of an exercise that can best be described as “speed dating.” Along with a couple dozen other UTS students, we rotated from room to room, trying to put our best face forward as representatives from area congregations did the same. It’s internship placement time at UTS.

Students in the Master of Divinity program are expected to do a minimum of two internships (well, three if you count the “mini-internship” the typical first-year student does in the mix). I am currently in the throes of my clinical pastoral education (CPE) unit at a large hospital. Next year I'll be doing my congregational internship with one of my speed dates.

It’s a combination of exciting and nerve-wracking to be in this position of entering a relationship with a congregation I’ve barely had a first date with, but I also have hope it will work out in the end. I wasn’t sure what to expect when I started my CPE experience and now can’t imagine how anything else can be more fulfilling than being present with people who are sometimes simultaneously at their best and at their worst in the life-or-death situations at the hospital. Now I’m looking at the specter of congregational ministry. I’m uncertain if I’m cut out to work in congregations, but that’s pretty much how I felt when I entered my chaplaincy internship.

These degree requirements are extraordinarily difficult. They’re time-consuming and are a much different learning experience than sitting in a classroom. But they are also an opportunity to apply what we’ve learned in an academic setting and make a real difference in the lives of others. On the days when it seems unbearable to pick up one more book or write one more paper, I reflect on how I’ve touched the lives of others and how they’ve entered my heart, and I stretch and grab my highlighter and get back to my studies. It’s a labor of love, and it’s time to learn to get to know a new love in my life.

- Jayne Helgevold, MDiv student

Returning

2012-02-17T10:09:00.000-06:00

As I sit quietly enough to reflect over the past two months I recall the rush of fall semester finals, followed by the holidays, a brief break, and then a frantic push to read as many books as I could before I left for the Global Justice Trip to Chiapas, Mexico. I managed to turn my final reflection paper in before the semester began. I am taking Preaching, Worship in the Church, and Constructive Theology. The amount of reading and work described in the syllabi is overwhelming. I have my own neurotic system of creating index cards for each assignment and cluster them together by weeks. I try to envision the time, intellectual capability, and energy to commit to these classes. I work hard to focus on the voice of gratitude over that of fear and complaint. Each index card represents new learning and an opportunity to engage in dialogue with the writer, my professor, and my classmates about issues important to our denominations and personal faith. What an extraordinary gift.

Running parallel to the school work are meetings with potential church-based internship sites for next year. I plan to do my full year internship in conjunction with the 15 hr./wk. internship required for the M.Div. I’ve had the opportunity to preach in three Unitarian Universalist Churches this year and I am excited to enter into a deeper relationship with a congregation next year. I can already see how the courses I am taking this semester will feed directly into my leadership and skills in a church setting.

My last area of focus is a 400/hr. spring and summer term internship with the Center for Public Ministry at United and Minnesota Unitarian Universalist Social Justice Alliance (MUUSJA). Several United students are doing internships within our own denominations as we work within faith communities to defeat the proposed constitutional amendment defining marriage as between one man and one woman in Nov. 2012. The long-term vision is a faith-based infrastructure that will work toward full relationship equality in Minnesota. My church, Unity Church Unitarian, has convened a multifaith group in St. Paul and I am excited to see what we can accomplish when we pool our passion, talents, and resources. As part of my internship I am chair of a committee which is planning a faith-based “Power Summit for key multifaith statewide leaders working to defeat the amendment. I appreciate the mix of theoretical and applied learning that this semester offers.

During quiet times my thoughts return to Chiapas. On our last day a number of us hiked a steep trail in the cloud forest. The altitude added a layer of challenge as with each vertical step my lungs filled to what felt like half of their capacity. Our experience in Chiapas speaking and worshiping with indigenous communities and local leaders reminded me of how easy it is for me to walk through my life totally unaware of the unending list of privileges that my skin color, education, and socio-economic status affords me. At the same time, I often feel my own marginalized status as a non-Christian in an ecumenical seminary and as a lesbian parent at a time in MN when it is open season on debating the value and validity of my primary relationship and family. Unitarian Universalists believe that faith is about the journey, not the destination. Without the hope of life beyond this one we need to look to this day and live it with integrity, service, and joy. I want build relationships across differences even though the air feels thinner and the steps are steeper than I ever imagined. United provides a place where I am pushed to keep climbing and where I can ask for time to rest when I need it. I’m not sure if there is a mountaintop I need to reach during my life time, but I can say for certain that the vistas along the way are breathtaking.

- Laura Smidzik, MDiv student

"Do you see where I am?"

2012-02-06T22:14:00.000-06:00

In the week before the start of spring semester, I am eager to get my hands on the books for the courses I’ll be taking: American Religious Histories, Constructive Theology and Worship. I am roughly midway through my seminary studies and I’ve been looking back at where I’ve been and looking forward toward what is still to come. When I think about it, perhaps a theological education was always in my future. In elementary school I asked for a book on saints and martyrs for a birthday present, and after reading it, I presented my father with an ethical, if not theological question. “Dad, suppose a person was about to be martyred for the faith and they realized they could do more good by staying alive, would it be wrong, then, to recant?” My father looked at me with a perplexed expression. I don’t remember his answer, but I remember his long, confounded gaze. We lived in Omaha, Nebraska, an ordinary family; we went to Mass on Sundays and our grandparents’ houses for dinner afterwards. There was nothing about our lives that suggested we were in danger of being martyred. Nor we were a family given to theological speculation: hearing adults ask each other what they thought of the new Pope was about as edgy as it got.

It was decades before I would understand the scope of my own question. I went to El Salvador for a global justice course as part of my seminary studies. In one of the books for the course, Witnesses to the Kingdom: The Martyrs of El Salvador and the Crucified Peoples, Jon Sobrino writes about the interconnected theologies of liberation and martyrdom. He notes: “For us – in contrast to most of the people in the first world – reality is a great hermeneutical aid.” There were things I could learn only by going to El Salvador and hearing people tell their stories. And there was something I could see only by walking with thousands of people through the streets of San Salvador with candles held aloft in the night to commemorate the assassination of Oscar Romero thirty years before. It was in those streets that I witnessed the reality of resurrection. Now I would be able to answer the question of my grade school self about refusing to recant vs. the pragmatic wisdom of staying alive: justice and love cannot be recanted. To refuse to recant them keeps them alive.

This was not something I imagined would be addressed when I enrolled in seminary. I remember someone asking me then, a bit incredulously, “What are you going to study there…God?” I suppose seminary brings to mind images of other worldliness, an endeavor removed from the jostle of life. I think people might be surprised at the this-worldliness of our studies, the spiritual life we try to give voice to together, coupled with life experiences in a hospital or prison, or parish internships, or global justice courses. I love both aspects of my studies; I love trying to address a question as absurd as, Who is God? and I value trying to ascertain what that means in the world in practice.

As I turn toward the new semester with anticipation, I recall standing in the chapel of Divina Providencia in San Salvador before the altar where Archbishop Romero was assassinated. My father had passed away by then, not knowing the turn my life had taken towards seminary and I thought of how surprised he would be if he knew where I was. In the stillness of that moment, the question formed suddenly in my heart. “Dad, do you see where I am?” I asked. It seemed to me that from somewhere in the world I heard him answer, “Yep.”
- Kathryn Price, MDiv student

An Ecumencial Impulse

2012-01-26T09:19:00.000-06:00

As I was growing up, I was exposed to some pretty mixed religious influences. My extended family is largely conservative evangelical. My parents raised me in the Episcopal Church. For the last twenty years or so, apart from dropping in on the occasional Quaker meeting, I have been a member of a Congregational church.

One thing that has been compelling for me about being in seminary is seeing what passions gave birth to those traditions. My first course on the history of theology was thrilling because I began to see the layers of choice and chance that contributed to the practices and diversity of our present-day churches. But it has always been mystifying to me how my very theologically savvy parents could make sense of moving from Nazarene to Episcopalian.

A year ago, as part of my American Religious Histories class, I did a paper on the origins of the Nazarene Church so I could get a better handle on how that came about. Last summer I took a course in UCC History and Polity – which included the Congregationalists in the mix. This January, I am rounding it out with a course in the Anglican (Episcopal) Tradition. With each pass, the path from Martin Luther to Phineas Bresee through John Wesley becomes clearer. Call me a geek but I find that pretty exciting!

But I am reminded that the history of religion has its dark sides as well. This month, I am preparing for a sermon about the relationship between scripture and slavery in America. In the process, I read about the struggle to end the slave trade in the British Empire. One account made clear that the Anglican Church – the predecessor of the church I was brought up in – benefited from and was complicit in maintaining this brutal injustice in the Caribbean. Pretty disturbing stuff!

Throughout seminary I have also been motivated to deepen my ecumenical and inter-faith awareness. A number of my closest friends in junior high headed off to Hebrew school many afternoons. I’ve gotten a taste of Judaism through taking a World Religions class, studying Hebrew a bit, and attending synagogue some. (I certainly want to know more about Hinduism!) As an adult, my first marriage was to an increasingly devout, conservative Catholic. Next semester, I’m taking a class through the St. Paul Seminary to get a taste of how Catholics approach the Pauline epistles differently than Protestants.

For years, I have been claimed by an ecumenical impulse: “why can’t we all just get along?” But while I love certain people and want to treasure their traditions, oftentimes, others who are also dear to me have clearly felt wounded by those very same faiths.

Still… I intend to somehow be part of healing those wounds while listening to those whose voices I have not yet fully heard.

-Karl Jones, MDiv student

Respite

2012-01-09T11:07:00.000-06:00

Late last week my mother called to say she was going to cancel her trip to Laughlin, Nevada because my sister had injured her back and couldn't travel. On other occasions, my response would have been, "Oh bummer. Guess you'll have to reschedule."

This time, my response was, "Unacceptable!" The difference is the logistics needed for mom to get away. As I mentioned before, my dad is currently under in-home hospice care and the program allows one 5-day opportunity for respite care. For mom to get away took countless phone calls with healthcare providers and social workers. For me to accompany her took a weekend's worth of doing my day job, including going in to the office on the holiday, and getting my ducks in a row.

I originally felt this sudden trip was one I was doing for my mother and, in the sense that I'm letting her drive the agenda, it is. But, despite the fact that I'm checking in with the office a couple of times a day, this is a good bit of respite for me, as well.

The seminary does a nice job of scheduling in respite times each semester -- it's called Reading Week. But for the large group of students who are holding down full-time jobs, that week becomes one of working overtime to catch up on neglected duties and taking what little time is left to attend to neglected family and school work. In short, there's very little rest for seminarians with families and jobs.

So, I'm taking a little time to reflect during this impromptu vacation on the craziness of the last semester -- one where I took a class, worked a job, did an intense internship on a cancer unit in a large hospital, provided assistance to my parents, loved my spouse, moved to a small room where I live for half of my week away from my home and family. While I think this is something I don't care to repeat (although I will be continuing this life until May), I can't think of which pieces I can cut out.

It's during these rare quiet times that I realize that, like many of my classmates, I am driven and encouraged by something greater than myself. Over the Christmas weekend, I woke up repeatedly thinking of the hymn "Spirit of the Living God, Fall Afresh on Me." I have to say, the Spirit has fallen on me so much during the past several months that the outside observer would think the Spirit may have imbibed in too many spirits.

I start my J-term 3-week intensive class on Monday. In 3 weeks' time, we accomplish the same amount of work as what is done in a regular semester. I'll be able to use a little vacation time (but less than I had planned because of my current detour), but the internship and family situation cannot be put on hold. Spirit, don't be too graceful. Fall as you may. I am ready.

- Jayne Helgevold, MDiv student

Discovering Your Work

2012-01-03T17:01:00.000-06:00

It feels somewhat surreal to go from the last few weeks of the term with papers and exams for four classes to the unstructured days of holiday break. I assume I am not alone in being greeted with a major cold as the gift that keeps on giving. I am anxiously awaiting the day I wake up with a clear head.

I have my syllabi from the last semester along with my papers and notebooks assembled and am preparing to write my Post-Course Reflections for my Integrated Notebook. Let me break that down a bit. Post-Course Reflections ask questions about each course you have completed and include: major learnings; what you wrestled with in the course; what were personal breakthroughs; and what you discovered about yourself during the course. It takes some discipline to complete these after each semester but the reward is that you can capture important information about your journey through seminary and where certain insights, growth, and stumbling blocks occur. The Integrated Notebook serves as an archive with all of your past papers, reflections, faculty evaluations of your work, etc. It provides an opportunity for you and your faculty advisor to see where you have come from and where you are going.

For me, in my crazy-paced life which tends to focus solely on the present, it provides proof of my hard-earned past and my yearning for the future. In my second year of seminary I can see a major shift in my academic competence and self-perception. Despite my frequent questioning of myself as “minister in formation,” that is exactly what I am. My Christmas list this year took a drastic shift and included a Unitarian Universalist (UU) chalice necklace, The Peoples’ Bible, and a UU Standing on the Side of Love sweatshirt and bag. I am now confident enough to say that I am in seminary and working toward ordination without fear of someone shattering a delicate connection to my new identity.

This week also includes: firming up logistics to secure a full-year (1548 hour) internship at a local UU church (which far exceeds the UTS internship requirement but is required by the Unitarian Universalist Association for ordination); preparation for sermons and services for several UU churches in MN this coming February; reading books to prepare for a 10-day UTS global justice trip to Chiapas, Mexico this January; making a calls for interfaith work in St. Paul to defeat the November 2012 ballot initiative which would enshrine discrimination in the MN constitution regarding the definition of marriage; and I am in discussion about a spiritual direction group with local women clergy this January in order to feed my own spiritual practice.

A quote attributed to Buddha sits within view of my desk “Your work is to discover your work and then with all your heart to give yourself to it.” As unlikely as it seemed a few years ago—I feel like I am becoming a minister. What an incredible gift to be able to do so.

-Laura Smidzik, MDiv student

First Semester is Complete! Merry Christmas

2011-12-16T14:01:00.001-06:00

     I have completed my first semester of seminary with the feeling of accomplishment, relief, exhaustion and giddiness. Given the advice to write down on a calendar all the due dates of the papers and exams, the end of the semester looked pretty daunting. I shared this calendar with my family, so that everybody would be aware of the times when I needed to study and buckle down. I do believe that this is a habit that will continue throughout my seminary experience. Speaking of family, mine are rock stars in all of this. My kids say they don’t even realize that I am at school because their schedule hasn’t changed. It has, they just haven’t noticed. On the days where our school schedules didn’t mesh they went to friends houses which was a treat in their minds, but a life-saver to me. I have a wonderful circle of friends willing to take my kids if there are last minute schedule conflicts. I have a husband whose work schedule is flexible enough to be home with the kids when needed. With this I say that God is good, all the time.

    I am feeling like I have made the right choice to come to seminary. All of the experiences so far have led me to believe that this is the place I am supposed to be.    Through all of the hard work and frustration, finally getting to that ah-ha moment when things become clear is rewarding beyond belief. Receiving encouragement from my professors has been a lifeline when I am not feeling so confident. Feeling the camaraderie with my fellow seminarians gives me the energy I crave. Witnessing authentic dialogue between classmates and professors feeds my soul and calms my spirit. It is like I am learning to swim, and understanding the basics, I am now ready to move on. Seminary is teaching me the life skill that I will need when I face the vast sometimes turbulent waters of life and am able to boldly swim with confidence and perseverance.

    I will not be taking a January-term class and am excited for next semester. For now I am going to enjoy the holidays with my family.

- Sarah Kronkvist, MARL student

In the Nadir

2011-12-06T13:19:00.000-06:00

The shadows come in the early afternoon at this time of the year, and the sun’s angle drops them across the landscape in low sweeps, and the light begins to fall away. The sun does not linger, but blinks out at the edge of the world, and we are in the deep. I listen to “O Come, O Come, Emmanuel,” and its plaintive hopefulness, the longing of centuries, comes down through the haunting music and the words. Sometimes I think have more common with the ancients than I have realized; I feel a nearly primal fear at the going of the light.

In my class on The Moral Thinking of Bonhoeffer, we are into the book Letters and Papers from Prison, and it is my turn to present a response to the reading for the week. It is a morning class, and we are back after Thanksgiving week, a little hazy after the holiday. I read Bonhoeffer’s words: “Never before in human history have there been a people for whom every available alternative seemed equally intolerable.” I pause, a space that seems necessary. My classmates and I look at each other across the room. It is a small class and that has allowed us a particular depth of discussion and exchange. We have challenged each other and ourselves as the weeks have gone on; I don’t think we ever leave a class session without knowing that something critical is at stake. As I leave the class, I am unable to forget other words Bonhoeffer wrote: “We thought we could make our way with reason and justice and when both failed….” And I think, well, if reason and justice fail…I mean, I believe in reason and justice. But how do I believe in them? As matters of faith? For even now, I see that reason and justice do fail, and fail repeatedly. Not always. But often enough. It is not a comforting conclusion.

My Bonhoeffer class is cross-pollinating with my Christian Ethics class this semester; and I find that I love the discussions and the challenges they bring. And I realize, finally, the key reason why I am pursuing this kind of education: it is an education that takes seriously the role of love in human affairs. Not love in an easy, sentimental way, but love as it has been passed to us in our wisdom and faith traditions; not love merely as textbook theories, but love in actual lives lived. Love that calls us somewhere. It will call some of us to parishes and prisons and hospitals, to teaching and preaching; it will call some of us out into the streets.

Before I leave school for the day, I stop to buy a book that my professor has just published. It is called Burning Center, Porous Borders. That night I open it up and read: “Once upon a time Abba Lot went to see Abba Joseph and said, “Abba, as much as I am able I practice a small rule, all the little fasts, some prayer and meditation, and remain quiet, and as much as possible I keep my thoughts clean. What else should I do?” Then the old monastic stood up and stretched out his hands toward heaven, and his fingers became like ten torches of flame. And he said, “Why not be completely turned into fire?”

“Yes, ‘why not be completely turned into fire?” my professor writes. “But what shall we do to be on fire?” What shall we do? The year has reached its nadir. The sun drops below the earth. Justice and reason might fail. Love, St. Paul said, never fails. Do I believe this? Yes. I believe it because there is a community who believes it and who has believed it for thousands of years. At times, it seems that we are crazy to believe it, but I wonder: wouldn’t we be crazy not to?

I fall asleep thinking of fire. I dream that I am holding a camel on a leash; the camel is pulling me west. Not towards a star in the east, but to California. (Okay, it’s a dream. And what Minnesotan doesn’t dream of California? ) I do not know that I will awaken to find out that my dog, my friend and companion of many walks and meditations under the stars, has died during the night. I do not know this yet, but when I do awaken, this community of seminary friends will be there, and they will comfort me.

Burning Center, Porous Border, by Eleazar Fernandez

The story of Abba Joseph is cited in Chittister, The Fire in These Ashes

- Kathryn Price, MA student

Encounters

2011-11-18T23:39:00.000-06:00

About four o’clock yesterday I quit studying at the library and headed home for an early dinner with friends. A couple weeks ago on a Saturday my wife and I had attended the first of a three-session anti-racism workshop. After tonight’s dinner we were all supposed to head out for the second installment. Fortunately, I had the presence of mind to realize that I was probably not up for taking time off from my studies to see more of my blind spots and explore the world’s problems in yet more depth.

The couple with whom we were having dinner are on-and-off-again Unitarian Universalists. Though I am the most religious of the bunch of us, we are deeply interested in each other’s lives. So when Peter asked about my week, I found myself talking about how overwhelming but thrilling it had been to do my midterm for Christian Ethics.

I still remember sitting in the library poring over Martin Luther King Jr.’s “Letter from Birmingham Jail” for the third time. It is always bracing to be in the presence of his courage and vision. But, this time, because I was formally studying it, I was struck by his rich knowledge of the philosophers and theologians that he was drawing on – from memory in his prison cell, initially. I found myself wanting to also absorb Plato and Tillich in breadth and in depth. But even more beautiful was the way that over and over he would take criticisms leveled by other pastors against him and the civil rights cause and reframe them as mandates which should be self-evident to anyone who carefully looked at Paul’s letters and Christ’s actions. The process of retracing MLK’s steps through this great letter left me awed by his mastery of rhetoric and hungry to be more grounded in scripture. That communion with such a great mind and spirit leaves me feeling like I’m in the right place.

The scramble to finish everything before the deadline – followed by detailed responses to the four case studies for my Final Integrative Seminar which were due a few days later – has also left me dead tired. After everyone else left for the racism workshop and I had finished the dishes, I crashed on the couch for a couple hours. Once my wife returned, we watched an episode of Commander In Chief – our decadent pleasure these days – before I switched gears and returned to my studies. For the last couple hours before bed, I read John Howard Yoder’s classic analysis of the gospels in which he lays out his fascinating picture of a thoroughly political Jesus.

This morning, after studying more and doing some of my work as a computer programmer, I biked over to the hospital. Each visit is different. Each day is its own adventure and brings its own lessons.

- Karl Jones, MDiv student

Wonderings Under the Autumn Moon

2011-11-12T21:27:00.000-06:00

Two evenings ago after days of taunts and false alarms, I found the first flakes falling I knew that the curtain was closing on my evening walks. At the beginning of the semester I was assigned readings about spiritual practices. One of the first of these practices required creating a time of solitude or reflection at the end of the day. I gave it a try and got quite used to it. Now it’s getting cold.

I can feel the days get dense and narrow near the end of autumn. They are already getting crushed into tiny units of clock time white-washed in fluorescent light where it only gets sunny and warm imagination.

This year’s long autumn tempted me with a secret cache of time and I took it. I stole off most evenings before bed into the suburban streets of Fridley kicking the fallen leaves just to hear them tumble and scrape against the concrete while I thought about Carolyn Pressler’s OT notes wondering what it means that anyone still reads the Hebrew Bible- that anyone even wrote it in the first place. In the long autumn I started to ask again what it mean that I am still reading the Bible, now that it opens up to me like a handful of tiny, bright stars sprinkled across the night sky, drawing me underneath its canopy so I can feel around and listen for new sounds.

What did those writers hear that made them into humans formed and aroused to life by the hands and breath of deity? What did they see that made them look again, certain that there was something else?

Did they see what Sojourner saw and that her mother saw when they looked up to the night sky? I’m looking and listening too, even to the leaves I’m kicking about with my feet while I think about Augustine and poor brother Luther. They did finally find an end (or at least a beginning to the end) to their tortures underneath that canopy as well. Whatever was said that inspired writing about an Abraham and a Moses must have also intoned with a surplus of resonance that outmatched Augustine’s desire and consoled Luther’s conscience with grace enough to account for the remainder. I think Augustine, Luther and Calvin did make some headway for us. They rendered aid to consciences seeking a place to rest. But what next?

Something remains that I can feel in the fallen leaves while the moon beams at me from behind soft charcoal clouds. I can feel it in my bones and I can hear it in Billy and Nina’s Strange Fruit and I think I see pieces of it in James Cone as well. The brother is right, you know, about Niebuhr’s investment in Jim Crow’s status quo. And I also think he is right that in the United States the cross of Jesus Christ is the spectacular lynching extravaganza that betrays a fatal flaw in Protestantism’s narcoleptic conscience that I still struggle to fully apprehend.

That makes me think again about the social context of Luke’s Gospel that Marilyn has burned into me and I remember that someone in Rome seems to have believed that frequent public hangings could permanently arrest movements toward liberation and sustain Rome’s idea of peace. Is it not an obscene joke that some American Christians recently believed that their place in the American dream would be secure if only congregations of White lynch mobs could be washed in the blood of crucified Black people? Crucifying Black people did not save expectant congregants eagerly grasping their children by the hand gazing with devotion upon our charred and dismembered remains in dark woods and crowded town squares and I wonder if they ever understood why not.

Then I ask the autumn moon and the fallen leaves and the one who made me notice them if it is not time to stop making their problem my problem too.

- Jermaine Ross, MDiv student

Be Strong and Courageous

2011-11-03T15:46:00.000-05:00

Pursuing a Master of Divinity is not for the faint of heart. Since the beginning of the semester, I have watched my father’s health continue to decline as he completes his sixth month of receiving hospice care. I have made an effort to be there as much as I can, which isn’t very much; I have spent two months at my clinical site watching life’s drama unfold as families make what is literally life or death decisions, and I have six more months to go. I have struggled to keep up with my studies with very little to show for it except for piles of books and reams of paper with random sections highlighted in hopes that it will have helped me with the midterm I’m turning in tomorrow (a few days prior to when this entry will post on our blog.) I have continued to work full-time. On top of that, I nearly got in a car accident on my way to class when I was so sleep-deprived that I pulled in front of a car that managed to swerve to safety despite my poor and dangerous driving.

It’s the last thing that put me and my family over the edge. While I can – and have – taken a fair amount of abuse to get through seminary, it’s when I put someone else’s safety in jeopardy that we realized something had to give, but what? I certainly am not going to cut back what amounts to a handful of hours with my dad and providing respite for my mother. Because of financial aid and scholarships, there are a minimum number of classes I have to take each year. Even if everything goes as planned, I’ll just be skimming by, and once before I had to pay back financial aid for some classes when I couldn’t hit the minimum – it’s too painful to do again. I can’t quit the clinical pastoral education (CPE) component; I need the credits and also it has truly become the part of my week I love the most, where I’m actually able to minister to others and see some purpose for why I’m doing everything else. What about the job? Well, my spouse was laid off some months back, so we need my paycheck, and perhaps more importantly, the benefits. Despite repeated requests to be allowed to cut my hours, my employer can’t swing it. As it is, there are already about 30% fewer of us in our area doing about 50% more work than in the past. I’ve already tried sleeping in my car (see paragraph above) and have learned that’s not a good choice, either.

It turns out the car is part of the solution. Well, not the car, but the commute. Despite the reduction in household income, we’ve determined that the best solution is that I rent a room in Minneapolis that’s about 15 minutes from work and 10 minutes from my clinical site. So, for the next six months, we’re paying a mortgage – and rent – so that I can at least have the chance to sleep nearly 8 hours a night, 4 nights a week. While others were taking time off during our reading week break and catching up on their lives and relationships, I was apartment hunting and transporting part of our household to a small room that is about as different a setting from our quiet rural home as I can fathom.

One of the patients I was assigned on my first day as a chaplain intern died this morning. I was with him and his family last night. He hasn’t been conscious for about two weeks, but I’ve still gone in and shared his favorite verse – Joshua 1:9.

Be strong and courageous. Do not be afraid; do not be discouraged, for the LORD your God will be with you wherever you go.

Over the last few months the two of us have reflected on the meaning of this verse for those of us who are crossing over to foreign lands. It was the last thing I said to him before I left last night, in hopes that there was still some part of his being that could hear me. While I have no doubt he believes this in his bones, I wanted to affirm for him – and for me – God will be with us wherever we go.

- Jayne Helgevold, MDiv student

Coming Up for Air (or, Reading Week)

2011-10-24T17:42:00.000-05:00

Reading week is finally here. (Deep sigh of relief inserted here.) This is my first term at UTS and I am exhausted. I am pursuing a MARL (Masters in Religious Leadership) on a part-time basis.

For those of you who don’t know, reading week is a kind gesture inserted into the middle of the term to allow people like me to catch up and have a bit of a breather from classes, and prepare for the weeks to come.

I do have a lot of reading this week, but also writing and studying. My first mid-term exam in Older Testament is coming up. The professor has gone over all of the material thoroughly and has made herself available via webcast and the class webpage over this next week. How cool is that? My small group for Theological Interpretation is finally meeting next week to go over our project on immigration. I also have to catch up on a book that I haven’t yet finished for that class (oops). Finally, I have a three page book review to write for Principles in Writing.

All of that seems feasible, but did I also mention that I have a family consisting of 2 kids (age 7 and 9) a supportive significant other, and two dogs? All of whom need meals, quality time, walks in the park, help with homework, and transportation to and from extracurricular and church activities, to name a few. I try to delegate as much as I can, but sometimes, the mom has to be the one to get the job done. I think I also forgot to mention the volunteer activities in my kid’s school and my church that I signed up for thinking that I could work them around my school schedule. Yeah, right.

Being exhausted from all of this is thrilling. The synapses in my brain haven’t been this busy in years. I’ve got a goofy smile on my face most of the time knowing I am exactly where I am meant to be. Answering the call to seminary has been an extremely fulfilling decision. It has opened my eyes in more ways than I could have ever imagine. Just the diversity of the denominations represented in the student body, helps to broaden and challenge my own theology. I’ve met other United Methodists, like myself, but also Unitarian Universalists, United Church of Christ, Quakers, undecideds, pagans, evangelicals, Jewish and Roman Catholics, all contributing to the same conversations with meaningful insights. This is an exciting time to be at seminary.

- Sarah Kronkvist, MARL student

A Full Life, A Blessed Life

2011-10-14T11:29:00.000-05:00

“You do not need to know precisely what is happening, or exactly where it is all going. What you need is to recognize the possibilities and challenges offered by the present moment, and to embrace them with courage, faith and hope.” - Thomas Merton, 20^th Century Catholic author

I am nearing the end of a six-week Working Toward Prayer class at my church Unity Unitarian-Church. We are all encouraged to deepen our own daily spiritual practice and to work on contemplative living as described by Thomas Merton. The quote above captures the spirit of engaging in each day as a form of prayer.

Although many times I do not “know precisely what is happening, or exactly where it is all going” I have no doubt that my courageous step of coming to UTS is the right one. As a Unitarian-Universalist (UU) in a Christian seminary there are many gifts offered from multi-faith perspectives. My small group in one class is comprised of me, a UCC student, a LDS (Mormon) student, and a classmate who describes her spiritual affiliation as “wandering but not lost.” This diversity of faith here was symbolized at last week’s chapel where a broad array of hymnals were displayed on the altar. This broad-range of faith traditions is part of the fabric of this place—I believe it stretches us all theologically and will make us stronger leaders in the multi-faith world we live in.

Part of the purpose of this blog is to share our lives as seminarians and to give a sense of an average week in the life of a student. Like so many students, I wear many hats throughout the week.

During this past week I:

Prepared for and attended my four classes (Historical Theology; UU Social Action; Synoptic Gospels; and Death, Dying and Bereavement). Topics we learned about and wrestled with included: St. Augustine, racism, Luke, and social media’s impact on grieving.
Wrote a sermon which I will preach at the UU church in Rochester later this month.
Hosted a prospective UTS student over a lunch hour.
Met with the core planning group about my church’s strategy for working on the anti-marriage amendment which is up for a vote in MN in Nov. 2012.
Attended three of my son’s flag football games at Ramsey Jr High and Central High School’s homecoming game where my oldest son played in the pep band.
Joined the director of the Prairie Star District at our weekly UTS-UU Student Group.
Presented with a colleague to ten UU ministers about the anti-marriage amendment and the intra- and inter-faith work that lies ahead.
Attended a classmate’s presentation on his summer travels to Laos, Cambodia and Thailand.
Continued to chair my church’s Board of Trustees nominating committee and spent time managing the teams’ work toward recruiting and interviewing three nominees.
Worshiped at a very moving chapel service with the sermon titled “I’m Coming Out.”
Spent time at family dinners, walks to DQ, and in transit with my sons and partner, Linda.

This afternoon I am off to a meeting with a core group of multi-faith leaders who are planning the state-wide faith-based component of the campaign to defeat the anti-marriage amendment in MN.

Tomorrow I turn 49…if my life is indeed a prayer then all I have to say is amen. It has been a full and blessed week.

-Laura Smidzik, M.Div. student

Arriving at the Intersection

2011-10-07T09:56:00.000-05:00

This week in my class on Major Twentieth Century Moral Thinkers, we considered issues that touched on questions I have asked myself over the last several months. Increasingly, I am hearing questions about religious affiliation and assertions of faith in the election season here in the United States. As a person who considered pursuing a graduate program in public policy at the same time that I was considering applying for admission to United Seminary, I wonder: where does my political voice leave off and my spiritual voice begin? Or, can these even be separated? Should they be?

I have made a commitment that my spiritual path stands firmly in this world, with its grit and grapple, its heartbreak and its joys. And it is a political world. Yet I do not want to conflate politics with God in such a way that I am unable to perceive one for the other. I think that a spiritual path transcends politics, though for me, it cannot abandon them.

What I love in particular about a theological education, and specifically this theological education, is that in studying here I arrive at the intersection of deeply moral questions, theological voices old and new, their application to social and political concerns, and my own spiritual path. The diversity of voices from different faith traditions deepens my own efforts in thinking about things critically and spiritually.

Two weeks ago at United’s Fall convocation, we celebrated the 50th anniversary of United Seminary. As we stood in the chapel for that service, I thought about the men and women who had founded this seminary 50 years before. What had they imagined for this place? What had they dreamed? Perhaps back then they had not quite imagined me, a woman raised in the Catholic tradition, who then attended a Bible College for three years, and following that considered herself an agnostic for many years, only to arrive here. But I, looking back at those men and women, have a sense of what they imagined from the kind of seminary they created -- and I owe them. I feel a sense of gratitude for the ecumenical vision they embraced. During my years of agnosticism, I continued to ask the questions that have always concerned me at heart: Who are we? Why are we here? How do we live with compassion and with integrity to ourselves and others in a complex world? Why do we so often stumble in trying to live our deepest aspirations? Even though we are always speaking and thinking within a specific context – as the courses at United make abundantly clear -- I imagine that these kinds of questions are asked in every context throughout the world. For some years, I thought I was better off asking them alone, without community and – let’s face it – its annoying encumbrances and sometimes grating disagreements. And maybe I did need some time alone for a while. But ultimately it is only within community that I can practice and test my faith, compare and contrast it with the experiences and traditions of others, and find my way to a deeper place. It is a richer place as well for all this.

This is the year in which I need to make a decision about whether to change my degree program to M.Div. Already I’m feeling currents within the scope of the classes I’m taking and of the experiences I’ve had here that I think will help me in making that decision. Sometimes I wish I had all the answers straight up. But that has not seemed to be my path. I think it’s going to be a good year.

-Kathryn Price, MA student

What a Week!

2011-09-30T09:39:00.002-05:00

This has been quite a week! Last weekend I hosted and was a pianist in a concert to benefit restorative justice. After months of preparation, it was a success both in attendance and money raised.

Here’s Monday. In the morning, I played for a ballet class, in the afternoon, biked to my chaplaincy training time (CPE) at the hospital and, in the evening, read about the future of churches in post-modernity.

After taking the bus out to seminary, I went to Tuesday’s midday chapel even though I was still in the middle of cramming to be up to speed with my reading and writing assignments for my Final Integrative Seminar in the afternoon. Chapel was a good respite. As soon as class was over (which included a lively discussion about the Holy Spirit), I bummed a ride from a classmate back to the hospital, eating dinner in the car, before my evening’s CPE classroom session started. This week half of us presented learning goals for the school year and got feedback from others. It was emotional to review what we see as our spiritual growing edges!

Wednesday morning, after first taking the car in to get looked at (reading while I waited), I played for another ballet class. After lunch, I met with a committee of ten about my sense of call to ministry in the UCC. Fresh out of the meeting, I got a call to do some computer programming ASAP. So – I headed off to Eagan to get that done. The afternoon’s committee meeting had been a bit grueling but not as bad as the period of second-guessing until getting a call later in the evening (while reading up for Friday). Finally, the process of discernment which informally started back in February or so became official from the denomination’s end!

After biking to the seminary from South Minneapolis, I spent Thursday morning organizing my time for the coming week, remembering to include chores at home. I read up some on the meditative practices we are to explore for class this coming week before assisting my friend Sonja in hosting chapel. After a bike ride to the hospital (through lots of wind) and four hours spent on the unit, I am done and drained. It’s hard to see how slow I am to grasp the simple feedback being offered! Here I am writing my blog post at home. Next, I will try to finish the reading for tomorrow’s class.

Friday morning I will finish the programming project started on Wednesday, then play piano for Parkinson’s patients. In the afternoon Christian Ethics class, we will discuss M. L. King’s “Letter from Birmingham Jail”, a novel, and the rest of this week’s reading. Then, I have a date with my wife!

Over the weekend, I plan on doing work to wrap up the summer’s independent study on the book of Revelation as well as starting our next book for Integrative class. Then it’s a breather before launching into next week!

- Karl Jones, MDiv student

Miles to go...

2011-09-23T16:04:00.002-05:00

Five courses, an internship and then some. That is my semester. It wouldn’t be my life if I weren’t doing a bit too much and trying to do it reasonable well. This is my last year in seminary, so I might as well go for it. Without a doubt, the semester has gotten on its way while I have been moving at a brisk, quad-burning yet manageable pace beside it. Even as I write this blog over a much needed double-espresso macchiato at Nina’s just before heading in to my internship site at Dayton Avenue Presbyterian, I’m in the cool down phase of my week. I’m taking inventory of the past twelve days wondering if the pace I’ve established is one that I can maintain until Christmas. Or will it pick up a bit? I hope it doesn’t but of course it will.

Happily, I have managed to get to bed at a decent hour every night since this semester began with the exception of last night. This morning my alarm fired off sirens and my body reacted in a protest of paralysis. It was six-thirty and I needed to post my interpretation and reflections on Genesis 2:4b-24. I subordinated the warring members of body into conformity with my plans and dragged my aching eyes and murmuring abdomen to the shower and remained there until everyone agreed: we are going to write that essay before breakfast! And so we did.

In addition to learning, this semester will be full of teaching. I am a teaching assistant in historical theology, running one more lap around a mountain range of classical Christian thought, more confident and curious this time than the last. My internship director is brave enough to loose me among his sheep with Ecclesiastes in hand for adult education. Another venturesome spirit has agreed to extend my Older Testament exegesis course to engage a group of young emerging church leaders attending Kwanzaa Presbyterian Church on the north side of town.

I am fortunate to have the diversity of these experiences available to me as I make decisions about my future in ministry and academics. It helps to have several great pastors and professors coach me with their wisdom and expertise with a spirit of generosity. With so much support and encouragement (and a little more sleep!) I am sure I can keep up the pace. But I think I need another shot before I go.

- Jermaine Ross, MDiv student

Swimming in a Sea of Chaos

2011-09-14T10:06:00.000-05:00

In the coming week, I’ll have put in at least 40 hours at the office (in addition to my 100-mile round trip commute); 8 hours of clinical time for my CPE plus another 3 hours of CPE group time and a couple hours of prep time. I’ll spend Friday afternoon in a classroom for my first day of Christian Ethics and a good chunk of my weekend doing the reading and prepping for next week’s class, since between work and my CPE schedule I don’t have time during the weekdays for school work. Oh yeah, I’ll spend a couple of hours on Sunday at my place of worship for education and centering. Then there’s my family. I try to spend at least part of one day visiting with my parents. Anything left is committed to my spouse, three dogs and two cats.

Am I crazy? Not really. I’m one of the many United students who have chosen to make the next important step in our vocational path and are straddling the line between wishing we could devote more of our time and energy to going to school and realizing if we wait, it may not happen. Many of us just hold our breaths and jump in with both feet and do it. Surprisingly, most of us survive … and flourish.

In my household, there are two of us attending United. My spouse has been attending part-time for about four years; I’ve just completed my third part-time year, with about three more to go. Sometimes we’re able to work out our schedules so that we can take a class together – in its own way, class and commute time becomes a “date” of sorts.

We appreciate each others' support, but even if we weren’t both in school, we’d still feel supported by the staff and students at United. I’ve been to graduate school before. Seminary brings the best of the mental rigor of grad school, without the competitiveness. That’s not to say we’re not challenged by our instructors and peers. Think about it for a moment: Many of us are hoping to become pastors at some point. For the time being, we are both ministered to and ministering our classmates, faculty and staff at United. That doesn’t mean the atmosphere is one of a big “hug-fest” – it does mean that there’s a level of accountability to one’s self and the United community to grow and challenge individually … and as a community.

If I’ve got to be swimming in a sea of chaos at this point in my life, at least I’m bobbing along in good company.

-Jayne Helgevold, MDiv student